1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a cutting apparatus for cutting (e.g., cutting or half cutting) a work-piece such as a ceramics package, a laminated board of a ceramic green sheet, a non-ceramic film material, a ceramic capacitor, a flexible board, a plastic sheet, and the like.
2. Description of the Related Art
Various cutting apparatuses exist which are commonly equipped with cutting blades. For example, a cutting apparatus may be provided for cutting a work-piece while moving the cutting apparatus or a table on which the work-piece is mounted. Additionally, a cutting apparatus may be provided for cutting the work-piece mounted on an index table while feeding the cutting apparatus a fixed amount.
In the case of an index table, the cutting apparatus executes cutting while the cutting apparatus is fed by a fixed amount, including a time that the index table is turned by an angle 90 degrees.
In an example, e.g., a laminated board of ceramic green sheet, is half-cut before being sintered into, e.g., a lattice pattern. The cutting apparatus includes a column provided with a driving source. The cutting apparatus is capable of moving a cutting blade in a vertical direction by a prescribed amount. The column may also be capable of moving a index table mounted with the work-piece on its surface. A driving source, including a servomotor, is driven to move the column by a prescribed pitch in a longitudinal direction. After the work-piece mounted on the surface of the index table is half-cut in a shape of a strip, leaving a peripheral fringe portion, the index table is turned by an angle of 90 degrees. Similarly at the time the column is moved by a prescribed pitch in a longitudinal direction, the drive source is driven, the work-piece on the surface of the index table is similarly subjected to half cutting on a surface and a rear face, and rectangular tips are obtained by cracking the board after sintering. Half-cutting a board while leaving the peripheral fringe portion is performed so that marks for cutting are provided on the peripheral fringe portion. The marks remain in the product (chip in rectangular shape) obtained by sintering.
However, when cutting the laminated board of, e.g., the ceramic green sheet before sintering into, e.g., a lattice pattern, the above described process is executed only from a surface side of the work-piece.
There are various demands for cutting or half-cutting in the work-piece. For example, the ceramics package, the laminated board of ceramic green sheet, the non-ceramic film material, the ceramics capacitor, the flexible board, the plastic sheet, a product chip portion, may be the work-piece. A parallelism may be required in a relationship between a knife edge of a cutting blade and a table surface. Normally, the surface of the index table may be a slanted flat surface inclined in one direction.
When the parallelism is not realized, perfect cutting can not be conducted. For example, edge breakage may be caused by colliding the cutting blade with the table. Additionally, depths of the half cutting from the surface side and rear face become non-uniform.
Problems may occur when the depth of the half-cutting is non-uniform in the laminated board of, e.g., the ceramic green sheet, before sintering. For example after sintering a crack, tipping or exfoliation may occur in cracking, particularly in a laminated board having a recess portion of a SAW filter or the like on a surface side. When half cutting is executed from a position in proximity to the recess portion where a joining area between layers is small, cracking may easily occur at a peripheral wall portion of the recessed portion due to the dispersion force produced in cracking. Accordingly, a problem of exfoliation of layer occurs.
Conventionally, as a method of realizing the parallelism, jack bolts are used to mount members of the index table to the bed. The index table is gradually jacked up by the jack bolts, while a plurality of points are measured between the knife edge of the cutting blade and the table surface formed of the inclined flat surface. Therefore, mounting the index table to the bed is remarkably complicated, and a long period of assembling time is required.